Musings of an Unfinished Woman

Broadening our horizons

Russell and I are trying to broaden our horizons and get out of our rut. While we always love spending time together, we can be somewhat predictable when we have the occasion to go out on a date. With the rainy weather on its way, we’re looking from some great (inexpensive places to go). We’ve been going to Esther Short Park in downtown Vancouver (near the interstate bridge). It's a really pretty park with a nice farmers market and no one seems to mind if we photograph the fruits and vegetables.

Last weekend wasn’t really great weather so we headed to the Sellwood area of town...it’s a very charming neighborhood with lots of cute shops, little gardens and tiny restaurants. With no particular destination in mind, we wandered, took photos of flowers until we stumbled into STARS, an Antique Mall. We spent a couple of hours wandering through. We asked the owners if we could take photos and their only request is that we not rearrange the displays or get in the way of other shoppers.

 
    

My idea of antiques are really old, ornate uncomfortable furniture or elaborate chandeliers, etc. And yes, there was some of that, but a lot of what we saw on display were items that took us back to our childhoods. My theory is that if the item is as old as you are, then it's not an antique! We bought a black rotary dial phone and I swear that it must weigh about 15 pounds...a relic from our childhood years. We saw kitchen canisters in the 50’s style of pink and turquoise, a train pull-toy that my brothers and I all grew up with and a pair of roller skates that strapped onto your shoes. We saw beautiful quilts, kitchen gadgets that I wouldn’t know how to work and hankies (remember those...my grandma always had at least two fresh hankies plus a roll of Mint Lifesavers in her purse). There were old cameras and a couple of radios with beautifully styled knobs and lettering.

 
I got online this week and did some research on upcoming events that we might like to go to, such as the Largest Antique Show (how do they know it’s the largest?), several holiday bazaars and festivals, along with a ton of great antique shops. We are both almost nutty about photographing flowers and landscapes, as well as what we call “details”. We’re a cheap date and have been taking picnic lunches to save money. Stay tuned for more photos from our Weekend Wanderings.

I met Sue and Cindy, two of my life group gals tonight for a girl’s night out. It’s wonderful to catch up, to share the good things and the challenges in each other’s lives, to be real and honest with each other. It’s been two years since I started my life group. My goal at the time was to develop some close relationships with women as we shared our lives and spent some time in prayer and study...a goal that has exceeded my expectations. I’m so thankful for the ladies in my group and for the support and love they extend to me and to each other. Life group fall season will kick off again in the next few weeks and I’m looking forward to our weekly meetings. There have been many weeks when I didn’t want to have anyone over, when I was tired or just didn’t feel like entertaining and leading...but without fail, those were the nights that I was blessed the most. I would love to have a couple more ladies join our group and leaving that in God’s hands.

 

Happy Friday!

 

A New Day

Yesterday was one of those emotional weepy days that we women sometimes have. I had a doctor appointment with a rheumatologist, my first visit with this doctor. To be honest with you, I was looking forward to the appointment, hoping that I would get some answers about why I’ve been feeling so crappy. It was definitely not my best doctor appointment ever. I absolutely love my primary care doctor, my nephrologist and my gastroenterologist (who knew I would have so many ologist’s in my life!). She was critical of my current treatments with my regular doctors, kept asking if my left eye was “bulging” out, which is an indication of Graves Disease, etc. I love Kaiser and have received excellent care, so was a bit taken aback by her bedside manner. My veins aren’t that great so it took three tries before they could find a big enough vein to fill eight vials of blood. In the last three weeks, I’ve had more than 20 vials of blood work done!

 
By the time I left Kaiser, I was upset and didn’t feel I had any answers at all. Last year, Russell took me to a lovely park in an area of town I’m not familiar with...it is Peninsula Park and Rose Garden. It is one of Portland’s older parks and features original lantern-style streetlights, stone pillars, beautiful brick walkways and walls and a 100 year old fountain in the center of a rose garden. Not just any rose garden but a 2 acre garden with almost 9000 rose bushes. Since taking Karen Russell’s photography class, I have been taking my camera with me. Even though it was cloudy with a chance of rain, I decided to stop at the park and “smell the roses” with my camera. One of the unexpected things I have discovered through the weeks of Karen’s class is that photography has the power to take me to a place of peace and tranquility. I spent over an hour wandering through the gardens, taking photos, enjoying the sight and smell of so many beautiful flowers and I was able to relax and let go...for awhile at least.

When I got home, I made the mistake of reading the literature that the doctor had given me on “possible diagnoses”. I was feeling so bruised and upset and couldn’t talk to Russell since he was driving the truck with a supervisor. You know how one thing can just make everything seem worse than it is...that’s how my afternoon went. Finally pulled myself together and tried to scrapbook, but when Russell was able to call it was to tell me he would be late getting home, which put me over the edge again, so I was rude to him. We rarely fight so having been rude and snippy to the one person who loves me unconditionally made me feel like a shrew. I’m thankful to have such a wonderful husband, who loves me in spite of my faults.

One of the photos I took yesterday was a piece of graffiti written on a brick wall...it says: "Try 2 Stop Me" and so that's my motto for today. I am choosing to stay positive and happy. In the words of Anne Shirley “today is a new day with no mistakes in it”. I don’t like being negative and weepy...it’s so exhausting. Being happy and positive is much easier, so I threw away the literature from the doctor and will wait until test results come back to face whatever diagnosis there is.

 

So...happy Friday! A few more photos from my walk in the garden. Have a great weekend!

 

 

 

 

Oregon Steamup

Russell, my brother Curtis and I spent Saturday at the Oregon Steam-up. This event is one that Russell and my brothers have attended for several years and I decided to tag along for the sole purpose of taking photos. I knew there would be a lot of “steam engines” but didn’t have any other expectations. Almost everything was outdoors and since the day started cool, I forego my Capri’s and sandals in favor of jeans and tennis shoes, andwas glad I did since it was very dusty. Judging by the smells and sounds, it felt a bit like we had been transported back to the turn of the 20th century…there was the smell of wood-burning furnaces, the sound of train whistles and steam tractors chugging down dirt and gravel roads, along with live big band music. The day started with the singing of the National Anthem (which always makes me teary-eyed) and how fitting that there were so many military vehicles (mostly vintage) with quite a few men in uniform in attendance.

The Great Oregon Steam-Up, organized by the Antique Powerland Museum, offers an impressive display including tractors, trains, automobiles, logging and military machinery — many dating back to the late 1800s and early 1900s. What I didn’t expect was a nostalgic trip back to my childhood. There was a fairly large “flea market section” where you could buy anything from tools, vintage tractors and wagons, glassware and dishes, old magazines, toys from my childhood and earlier. It was a history lesson of sorts. We bought three things: a small vase for $2; the October 10, 1953 issue of The Saturday Evening Post magazine, and much to my delight…a Montgomery Ward catalog from 1964 (I was five years old then). This “catalog” (we called it a wish book when I was a little girl) had some of the same furniture, wall hangings, kitchenware, and material that my Mom used to sew some of my dresses from. As a scrapbooker and someone who is the family historian, I was thrilled to find this piece of my childhood. 46 years later and it’s in impeccable shape.

I don’t get to spend as much time with my brothers as I’d like, so it was a treat to share the day with my little brother, Curtis. He co-owns a thermal heating and cooling company called The Heat Exchange and like many of us, is feeling the pinch of the economy. Curtis is a gentle giant and of my three brothers (our birthdays are four days apart), the one most like me…we share many of the same character traits and he’s as organized, methodical and efficient as I am. This photo is of Russell (on the left) and Curtis in front of an old wagon loaded with...well who knows! 

One of the best advances in electronics in my opinion is that of digital photography. Between us, Russell and I took over 500 photos. In the last few years, as Shanna has become less photogenic (I think it’s a teen thing!), I have turned my camera lens to other more cooperative subjects, such as flowers, landscapes and what I am now calling “details”. They are the things in our life, some ordinary and some not, that we often don’t pay any attention to. In order to share more of my photos, I have started a second blog: Life Through the Lens. Take a look if you have time. Happy Monday!

Photography and Midnight Musings

Shanna and her road trip friends made it from Portland, Oregon to Florence, California (a distance of 985 miles) in a record-breaking 12 hours. They left here on Tuesday night at 11:40, had dinner in Hollywood on Wednesday night, spent Thursday at Disneyland, part of Friday at the coast and got home about 1:00 pm on Saturday afternoon. A trip to California and back in 85 hours…holy smokes. Now that’s a road trip!

It’s no secret that I love photography. We have a Canon “point and shoot” and my Canon Xsi that I got when I enrolled in the Integrated Media program last fall at the community college. I have to admit that Russell was a fan of SLR cameras long before I was…when we first got married, he owned a Minolta SLR (those were the days of film). I was never interested in learning how to use it and was quite happy with an “automatic camera” but now that I know the capabilities of an SRL, I can’t bring myself to use the point and shoot anymore. I’m in week four of Karen Russell’s photography course and Russell has gone with me on all my assignment photo shoots…and we’ve taken turns using the DSLR camera. Russell and I have always enjoyed being together and spend a lot of time in our craft room (he model railroads and I scrapbook).

 

Photography is the one hobby (other than Disney) that we both love. I’ve been selling stuff on Craigslist and we decided to use that money and Russell’s birthday money to invest in another camera so we could both learn and have fun together. I’ve been watching Craigslist and Ebay for a good bargain on a camera. We wanted to buy from a proven seller and didn’t want to pay full-price. After a couple weeks of research and several tries, I finally had the winning bid on an Ebay auction and we are now the proud owners of a Canon T1i at about half the regular price! Our assignment that we turned in yesterday was about depth of field and creative apertures, something I’ve never really experimented with. I spent several hours on Friday trying different things on my camera…all I can say is “thank God for digital”! Since our daughter is all grown up and not that camera-friendly anymore; we don’t have willing or available subjects to photograph so we have to get creative. We’re making a list of photography dates for the next several weeks, and the best part…other than developing (and I only print a fraction of the photos I take), is that there’s no “additional” cost for this hobby of ours.  

 

My brother, Curtis and his wife Jennifer hosted a family barbecue at their house. I’m not sure why we don’t get together more often but we had a good time. I consider Curtis and Jennifer to be “master gardeners” (the flower arrangement is all from their garden!). They have an incredibly beautiful yard and waterfall/pond. Shanna brought her friend Jason over and he was treated to the full force of our little family. We are a loud, everyone talk at once kind of family…lots of jokes, movie lines and remember when stories.

 

Traditionally, Sunday is my worst sleeping night, and last night was no exception. Went to bed at 10 pm, felt really tired…dozed, tossed and turned until I finally gave up. I was up until about 3:30 am. I’ve learned there’s no use lying in bed trying to fall asleep…it doesn’t work and I don’t want to be the cause of Russell not sleeping. There’s something about being up in the middle of the night like that. I would have sat on our deck but the mosquitoes are really bad this year – very unusual for Oregon. So I settled for opening the sliding door and listened to the night sounds. We live in a quiet neighborhood and with a wooded section behind us, are blessed to have the sounds of nature right outside our deck door…an owl, the occasional howl or bark of coyotes, frogs and in the distance, trains and planes.

 

As I sat in our living room listening to the night noises, I was so thankful to be living my life and am really trying to focus on the positive…to be thankful for who I am and what I have in my life…to live more in the moment. I’m thankful my daughter is home safe from her road trip. I’m thankful that I have a husband who wants to spend time with me and that we share such a wonderful life together. I’m thankful for family, and who loves me for who I am. One of my dear friends is going in for a biopsy tomorrow and I’m reminded once again of how precious life is and how much we take for granted. You’re in my thoughts and prayers Sue.

 

The fabulous view from our deck...

Photography...looking at life with a new view

Thanks to my fast fingers, I was one of the lucky ones who was able to register for Karen Russell’s “Photographer’s Workshop” Karen Russell blog which started on June 21 (registration was way back in January). I’ve been a fan of her blog and photography for a long time. She shares her life in an authentic, humorous way and her photography beautifully captures her family and home life. Her class is an online in-depth nine week class which focuses on lessons and assignments designed to teach us how to see those “everyday moments” and document them in photographs.

Russell and I are going through the lessons together and are learning a lot about using our camera and how to get the best photos. Karen’s philosophy is about capturing emotionally perfect photos and hopefully, in the process, making them look great too. I highly recommend this class if you have the opportunity. She is more than generous with her knowledge and there’s lots of sharing with other students and Karen critiques your weekly assignments. This last week was all about aperture, F-stop, depth of field, etc. The first photo was from our week one assignment and it's of our sweet bunny Dopey.

 

This week our assignment was to take photos which showed freezing motion versus implying motion, and then experiment with shutter speeds. Since we don’t have a small child around us anymore (and teenagers are more prickly about having their photos taken), we have to be more creative with how we get some of our shots.

 

Russell and I went to downtown Vancouver with the intention of going to the Farmer’s Market, which is by Esther Short Park. I love flowers – vases, flowerbeds, photos – so I was delighted to see lots of beautiful flower beds along with a lovely waterfall/creek that runs through the park. On our walk to the Farmer’s Market, we ran into this wonderful “water art sculpture” created completely out of recycled signs and other objects used by the city. Karen’s class is challenging me to look at life and document it in new ways. Sometimes, we all need a new perspective…to look at things in a different way. I tend to be a look straight at it (literally and figuratively) kind of person, so am trying to “slant my view”.

 

Here's a few of our photos from our "photo shoot" (that sounds fancy and professional doesn't it!).

 
 

 

Shanna found my phone last night...it's a small thing but I'm happy to have it back. The old one I was using was so old it wasn't blue-tooth capable. I found out yesterday that I didn't get the job that I interviewed for last Monday...I'll get a job in God's time and in the meantime, I am determined to use the time to get some projects done, learn how to be a better photographer and even get some scrapping done.